


Abandoned

by quiettewandering



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, First Kiss, Human Castiel, Love Confession, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-01
Updated: 2017-02-01
Packaged: 2018-09-21 07:38:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9538199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quiettewandering/pseuds/quiettewandering
Summary: Dean finds Castiel's journal from when he was human.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This was an anon prompt I got on my tumblr. Enjoy :)

It’s not something Dean means to find. 

He knows that, because it’s shoved underneath the passenger seat of Cas’s old pick up truck with various bottles of water and crumpled up trash sprawled over it. 

Dean just wanted to clean out Cas’s Continental; a way to get Cas feeling a bit better about the world, about the fact that he is walking around with stolen grace and after having been through a shitty bender of being human. Dean thinks that he can help from ridding Cas of a little clutter. 

So, even though he doesn’t mean to find it, he bumps against it as he is sticking his hand under the seat, fishing for garbage to dispose of. 

It’s a journal; with worn leather and a string wrapped around it to keep it closed. Dean picks it up, and opens to the first page. 

 _He abandoned me,_ says the first line. In Cas’s rough cursive handwriting.

Yeah, Dean was definitely not meant to find this. 

He shoves it into his jacket pocket, dutifully finishing his task of cleaning the truck. Resolutely ignoring the fact that something very important and very personal is sitting heavy against his chest.

Dean ignores reading it as long as he can; tries to convince himself that he’ll just leave it where he found it, or give it to Cas and advise him to find a better place to hide his personal belongings. 

Cas is such a private person–well, a private angel. Half the time Dean isn’t fully convinced that Cas is telling the whole story of what is going through his head. If he could just have a little insight. A little clarity into what Cas really was experiencing; why he seemed convinced to be Atlas and always have the world on his shoulders.

In his bedroom, after staring at the worn leather for a good half an hour, Dean cracks open the worn pages. 

_He abandoned me._

Dean takes a steady breath and reads on.

_It all seemed like it would be okay. Of course, me turning human isn’t ideal - but I thought I could at least do research, maybe get trained in hunting if only a little. I thought I could still be service to the fight. Be of service to Dean._

_But he abandoned me._  

Dean presses his face into his palms. He should not be reading this. He should not. If this is about him, he has no right. 

After an inner crisis that lasts for five more minutes, Dean reads on.

 _For the longest time, I have served God. It was my purpose. Somehow, Dean became my purpose, but I don’t mind it. I’m always happy to serve Dean, and Sam. But now that I’m on my own, without anyone to serve but myself, I am at such a loss. I help Nora with various tasks around the gas station; but it’s not the same. I don’t feel like I’m serving a purpose that_ matters. _God mattered, once. Dean still certainly matters. And yet I can’t serve either._

Dean skims ahead, turning a few pages into the journal. He reads an entry that is dated the day after Dean came to visit Cas.

_Sometimes we can’t help the things that happen to us. Sometimes horrible things happen, beyond our control. I know why Dean kicked me out of the bunker; it was a way to save Sam. I don’t know why, but it was. I know that Dean acted callous and abrupt because he is afraid of showing vulnerable emotion; and I know that it’s difficult for him to let people down._

_Despite the situations Dean and I find ourselves in, where one of us is forced to hurt the other or make it difficult for each other in some way, my feelings never change._

_He abandoned me. I was rejected by God, by all of Heaven, and then him. But unlike God, and unlike the angels I used to serve, I still love him._

_Father help me, why do I still love him._

Dean drops the journal like it’s a hot poker. He stumbles to his feet and paces his room, running his fingers through his hair. This was the  _worst_ invasion of someone’s privacy - of Cas’s privacy - and he did it without more than a few minute’s hesitation. 

Now he can’t erase the words searing his brain: _I still love him._

Dean huffs a humorless laugh and sits at the edge of the bed, head in his hands. But Cas wrote this _years_ ago - it can’t still be true. After all the shit Dean has dealt to him, after all the things Cas has gone through, he must realize now how untrue that love is. How undeserving Dean is of that love in the first place.

Snatching the journal from the bed, Dean stomps into the bunker’s library. Cas is hunched over a thick book, hands tangled in his messy dark hair, his trench coat crumpled. He raises surprised blue eyes in Dean’s direction. There are dark circles under them, like bruises. 

“Dean,” he says with surprise. 

How could Dean not see it? How stupid could he be? “Cas,” Dean says, his voice not much more than a croak.

Cas frowns, eyes flickering to Dean’s hands. His face pales. “Oh.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Dean asks hoarsely.

“You -” Cas’s voice catches. He straightens his back and shuts the book in front of him calmly. “You abandoned me. I got the message.”

“Fuck.” Dean stumbles toward Cas’s chair, crouching before Cas. “I didn’t know.”

“I didn’t want you to know,” Cas says, eyes steadily looking forward, away from Dean.

“I _needed_ to know - “

“No!” Cas glares into Dean’s eyes, expression stormy. “You never needed to be burdened with that. With me.”

“Cas, you _idiot.”_ Dean clutches at Cas’s coat, like it’s a lifeline. “If you told me - if you had so much as indicated - “ He takes a shaky breath. “I love you too. Despite our shitty circumstances, despite the fucked-up situations we find ourselves in that make us hurt each other - I love you too.”

Cas slowly blinks at Dean, processing his words. He frames Dean’s face with his hands, and leans forward to press his forehead against Dean’s. “You abandoned me,” he whispers. 

“I never will again,” is all Dean can manage breathlessly as he catches Castiel’s lips with his own to melt into an endless, lovely kiss. 


End file.
